Nagish is Now Rylo

Introducing Rylo

We're excited to announce that Nagish is rebranding to Rylo.

Our mission stays the same, but we have a new name and a much bigger vision.

Why the name is changing

Nagish was initially created as a school project in 2019. In 2020, it was rebuilt to address the communication needs of the Deaf community during the COVID-19 pandemic. By 2022, we rebuilt it again to meet the growing demand for our services. We never intended to make Nagish a company. We just wanted to solve a problem that felt impossible to ignore: Over a billion people are Deaf or hard of hearing, and the tools built to help them communicate are, frankly, broken.

People who are deaf or hard of hearing were stuck with communication tools that hadn't meaningfully changed in decades. Slow. Clunky. Built for someone else's idea of accessibility. A call center, a human operator in the middle, delays, dropped context, and no privacy. We knew there was a better way. Our journey with Nagish revealed what was missing and inspired us to reimagine how communication could work.

As our vision evolved, so did our sense of what was possible. The name Nagish, meaning 'accessible' in Hebrew, came to us quickly and fit the moment. But as our community grew, we realized the name captured only part of our story. Accessibility is the floor, not the ceiling. Our community deserves more than access. It deserves tools that work, on every call, in every room, every time.

Rylo is what comes next.

What Rylo means

Rylo is the relay service you can rely on. The last one you'll ever need.

While legacy relay services operated at a single layer, simply passing words between callers, Rylo works differently. We operate at both the application and network layers, allowing us to meet our community wherever communication happens.

And instead of a call center, Rylo uses AI. It’s always available, blazing fast, and every conversation stays completely private. There’s no human operator in the middle, just you and the person you are calling.

We didn't stop there.

A communication engine, not just a phone tool

The Deaf and hard-of-hearing community doesn't only communicate by phone. People talk in restaurants, at work, in classrooms, at the doctor's office. Until now, accessible communication has meant a different tool for every setting. Most of them never talked to each other.

Rylo is one engine for all of it:

• In person
• Over the phone
• At work

In the next few weeks, we'll be launching the Rylo product suite. Each product runs on the same core promise. Every word, captured. Every voice, clear. Every conversation, yours.

Starting with Rylo Phone

The Nagish app is becoming Rylo Phone. It's a full rebuild of our IP CTS (Internet Protocol Captioned Telephone Service) and IP Relay products, based on years of feedback from the people who use them every day.

What's new:

• Sub-50ms load and response time on every interaction
• Native feel on iOS and Android
• Captioning and text-to-speech accuracy beyond anything we've shipped before
• A new set of natural-sounding voices for non-verbal users
• An AI call layer that adds real-time call context, sentiment analysis, tone detection, and smart predictions

Privacy stays where it belongs. Every conversation on Rylo Phone is 100% private and secure. No call centers. No humans on the line. No exceptions.

If you're a Nagish user, your account, history, and settings move with you. Nothing to do. Same login. New name on the door.

Over $100M raised to achieve our vision of accessibility

To reach the more than one billion people living with hearing loss worldwide, we're also announcing today that we have raised $85 million in new growth funding from General Catalyst, Canaan, and our existing investors. Total funding to date is now over $100 million.

The money goes to one thing. Building the next generation of communication tech for our community. Faster models. Better accuracy. More languages. Tools that meet people where they live and work, not where the old phone system decided they should.

What stays the same

Our name has changed. What we care about hasn't.

Rylo is still built by people who use it. We're still obsessed with the details. We still believe the barrier is in the world, not in our community. And we're still here to remove it.

Hearing isn't a requirement for good conversation. It never was.

Common questions about the Nagish to Rylo rebrand

What happened to Nagish? Nagish is now Rylo. Same company, same team, same mission. We're changing our name to reflect a wider product vision that goes beyond the original Nagish app.

Do I need to download a new app? No. The Nagish app is becoming Rylo Phone, with major upgrades. Your account, call history, and settings move with you. You'll see the new name and design the next time you open the app.

Is Rylo Phone still free? Yes. IP CTS and IP Relay services on Rylo Phone are free for people with hearing loss in the United States, the same way they were on Nagish.

Is Rylo still a certified relay provider? Yes. Rylo provides FCC-certified relay services, including IP CTS and IP Relay.

What's different about Rylo's AI relay service? Rylo runs without a traditional call center. The AI provides captioning and text to speech on calls in real time, with ultra fast response times, on a network layer built for accuracy and speed. No human assistants are on the line.

Is the new product suite available now? Rylo Phone is rolling out today. The rest of the Rylo product suite, built for in-person and workplace conversations, ships over the next few weeks.

Try Rylo

If you've never used Nagish, now's a good time to start. Download Rylo Phone free on iOS or Android and try it on your next call.

If you've been with us as Nagish, thank you. Your trust is what made this possible. The app you know is about to get a lot better. Look forward to working together to make it better and better.